💀LIQUID DEATH Founder+CEO!💀 GUEST!! Mike Cessario on Secrets to Content, Growth, and Marketing! | Ep. 434

Do This, NOT That: Marketing Tips with Jay Schwedelson

GURU Media Hub

Growth, Education, Email, Business, Revenue, How To, Entrepreneurship, Marketing, Profit, B2b, B2c

5 • 715 Ratings

🗓️ 23 October 2025

⏱️ 22 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Liquid Death didn’t happen by accident. Mike Cessario went from skateboards and punk bands to building a beverage brand that treats marketing like entertainment, not homework, and he’s brutally honest about what actually moves the needle. With Jay Schwedelson, he breaks down packaging as the real moat, why they tested the brand before the product, and how to stay interesting when AI makes content cheap.

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Grab Liquid Death at your local store or online at www.liquiddeath.com, check out their sparkling lineup, and catch Mike at the upcoming Guru Conference for a deeper dive into their marketing playbook.

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Best Moments:

(02:45) From punk bands and agency life to launching a product so he could finally be the client

(05:04) Why water was the wedge - biggest category, boring brands, plastic everywhere, then a portfolio beyond plain water

(06:55) Most products are commodities - brand and aesthetics win hearts, not tiny functional differences

(08:40) The Facebook fakeout - 3M views and 80k followers before a single can existed, then used to raise money

(11:50) Entertainment first and small bets - nothing over 150k, in-house beats a 650k “at cost” bid

(13:40) Full-funnel media done right - broad awareness feeding precise mid-funnel and conversion work

(16:10) AI as cost saver, not taste maker - youth backlash is real and craft still matters

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Check out our 100% FREE + VIRTUAL EVENTS! ->

Guru Conference - The World's Largest Virtual EMAIL MARKETING Conference - Nov 6-7!

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Check out Jay’s YOUTUBE Channel: https://www.youtube.com/@schwedelson

Check out Jay’s TIKTOK: https://www.tiktok.com/@schwedelson

Check Out Jay's INSTAGRAM: https://www.instagram.com/jayschwedelson/

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MASSIVE thank you to our Sponsor, Marigold!!

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Transcript

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0:00.0	Welcome to Do This, Not That, the podcast from marketers.
0:05.4	We share quick tips, things you can do right now, and then we add a little bit of chaos at the end of every episode.
0:11.6	We also keep it short, like this intro. Let's check it out.
0:16.1	We are back for Do This, Not That podcast, and we easily have the coolest guy or girl or human that we
0:22.3	ever had on the show. It's not even a question. So who do we got here? We got Mike Cesario, who is the founder and CEO of Liquid Death. Now, if you don't know what Liquid Death is, you're a nerd. It's just that simple. So I'll tell you what it is for those who don't know. And if you do know, then you're not a nerd.
0:36.3	That's the litmus test.
0:37.7	Liquid death is one of the fastest growing beverage companies and brands of all
0:43.2	time. I can't even believe this because I feel like I've known liquid death forever, but this thing
0:47.7	only started in 2019. And by 2023, it had reached $263 million in retail sales and expanded to over 133,000 stores
0:58.2	globally with a valuation over $1.4 billion.
1:01.6	And it's all Mike's fault.
1:03.0	Okay.
1:03.3	And he didn't grow up in some sort of consumer package goods company and he just rose up
1:06.8	through the ranks.
1:07.7	The dude was a skateboarder.
1:09.1	He was in punk bands.
1:10.4	He was doing all this, everything you couldn't imagine. But then he did go in the agency rowdy. He knew all this stuff. And he created this monster of a community, of a brand, of a thing. And we're going to dig into all of it. So Mike, welcome to the show, man. Thanks for having me. Awesome. All right. What did I get wrong? How did this all happen? How did Mike become Mike? What did I mess up?
1:32.0	Yeah, I think you got it pretty close. Yeah, I mean, I grew up outside Philadelphia and Delaware kind of area and yeah, was playing in band since probably seventh or eighth grade.
1:48.8	When I was in seventh grade, the Green Day Dookie album came out.
1:53.2	And that was what like was the pathway to punk rock and no effects and all of that that,
1:59.6	that I think kind of like shaped my path.
2:02.6	Then being in a band, I was the guy that was silk screening the t-shirts and just, you know,
	...

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